September 20 Sunday – In Lake Bourget, Switzerland Sam wrote in his “part diary and part comment” log:
In the morning I looked out of my window and saw the tops of trees below me, thick and beautiful foliage, and below the trees was the bright blue water of the lake shining in the sun. The window seemed to be about two hundred feet above the water, An airy and inspiring situation, indeed. A pope was born in that room a couple of centuries ago. I forget his name. …
Breakfast was served in the open air on a precipice in a little arbor sheltered by vines, with glimpses through the tree tops of the blue water far below, and with also a wide prospect of mountain scenery. The coffee was the best I ever drank in Europe.
Presently there was a bugle blast from somewhere about the battlements — a fine Middle Age effect — and after a moment it was answered from the further shore of the lake, and we saw a boat put out from that shore. It was ours. We were soon on board and away [Neider, Complete Essays 595-6].
And then he wrote two notes to Livy, written on the boat:
Sunday, 11 a.m. On the lake Bourget — just started. The castle of Chatillon high overhead showing above the trees. It was a wonderfully still place to sleep in. Beside us there was nobody in it but a woman, a boy and a dog. A Pope was born in the room I slept in. No, he became a Pope later.
The lake is smooth as glass — a brilliant sun is shining.
Our boat is comfortable and shady with its awning.
11.20 We have crossed the lake and are entering the canal. Shall presently be in the Rhone.
NOON. Nearly down to the Rhone. Passing the village of Chanaz.
Goodbye Sweetheart
SLC
3.15 p. m. Sunday. We have been in the Rhone 3 hours. It is unimaginably still & reposeful and cool & soft & breezy. No rowing or work of any kind to do — we merely float with the current — we glide noiseless & swift — as fast as a London cab-horse rips along — 8 miles an hour — the swiftest current I’ve ever boated in. We have the entire river to ourselves — nowhere a boat of any kind.
Note: Sam added details, questions and concerns about the rental in Berlin for the winter [MTB 924; MTP].
From “Down the Rhone” (originally titled “Innocents Adrift”):
…presently Chanaz came in sight and the canal bore us along its front — along its street, for it had only one. We stepped ashore. There was a roll of distant drums, and soon a company or two of French infantry came marching by. All the citizens were out, and every male took off his hat politely as the soldiers moved past him, and this salute was always returned by the officers….We got some hot fried fish in Chanaz and took them aboard and cleared out. With grapes and claret and bread they made a satisfactory luncheon. We paddled a hundred yards, turned a rock corner, and here was the furious gray current of the Rhone just a-whistling by! We crept into it from the narrow canal, and laid in the oars. The floating was begun. One needs no oar-help in a current like that. The shore seemed to fairly spin past. …
The river where we entered it was about a hundred yards wide, and very deep. The water was at medium stage. The Rhone is not a very long river — six hundred miles — but it carries a bigger mass of water to the sea than any other French stream.
For the first few miles we had lonely shores — hardly ever a house. On the left bank we had high precipices and domed hills; right bank low and wooded.
At 1.25 p.m. we passed the slumberous village of Massigneux de Rive on the right and the ditto village of Huissier on the left (in Savoie). We had to take all names by sound from the Admiral; he said nobody could spell them. …
2.10 p.m. — It is delightfully cool, breezy, shady (under the canopy), and still. Much smoking and lazy reflecting. …There was such a rush, and boom, and life, and confusion, and activity in Geneva yesterday — how remote all that seems now, how wholly vanished away and gone out of the world!
2.15. — Village of Yenne. Iron suspension bridge. On the heights back of the town a chapel with a tower like a thimble, and a very tall white Virgin standing on it.
2.25. — Precipices on both sides now. River narrow — sixty yards.
2.30. — Immense precipice on the right bank, with groups of buildings (Pierre Chatel) planted on the very edge of it. In its near neighborhood a massive and picturesque fortification. …
2.45. — Below that second bridge. On top of the bluffs more fortifications. Low banks on both sides here.
2.50. — Now both sets of fortifications show up, look huge and formidable, and are finely grouped. Through the glass they seem deserted and falling to ruin. Out of date, perhaps.
At midafternoon we passed a steep and lofty bluff — right bank — which was crowned with the moldering ruins of a castle overgrown with trees. A relic of the Roman times, the Admiral said. …
The dreamy repose, the infinite peace of these tranquil shores, this Sabbath stillness, this noiseless motion, this strange absence of the sense of sin, and the stranger absence of the desire to commit it — this was the perfectest day the year had brought!
4.20. — Bronze statue of the Virgin on a sterile hill slope.
4.45. — Ruined Roman tower on a bluff. Belongs to the no-name series.
5. — Some more Roman ruins in the distance.
At 6 o’clock we rounded to. We stepped ashore in a woodsy and lonely place and walked a short mile through a country lane to the sizable and rather modern-looking village of St.-Genix. [Geuix]. Part of the way we followed another pleasure party — six or eight little children riding aloft on a mountain of fragrant hay. This is the earliest form of the human pleasure excursion, and for utter joy and perfect contentment it stands alone in a man’s threescore years and ten; all that come after it have flaws, but this has none.
We put up at the Hotel Labully, in the little square where the church stands. Satisfactory dinner. [Neider, Complete Essays 598-600].
Note: Arthur L. Scott’s article, “The Innocents Adrift Edited by Mark Twain’s Official Biographer,” PMLA, Vol. 78, No.3, (June, 1963), p.230-7 covers in depth how Paine butchered this piece, which was initially to be a full-length book. Paine changed the title to “Down the Rhone” and the castrated version was published in Europe and Elsewhere, 1923.
Sam’s letter of Sept. 21 to Livy reveals his later activities from his first day’s river travel, but gives an hour earlier on stepping ashore:
We went ashore at 5 p.m. yesterday, dear heart, and walked a short mile to St. Geuix, a big village, and took quarters at the principal inn; had a good dinner and afterwards a long walk out of town on the banks of the Guiers till 7.30.
Went to bed at 8.30 and continued to make notes and read books and newspapers till midnight [MTLP 2: 550]. (Editorial emphasis.)